Monday, August 22, 2011

I'm gonna level with you here. Of the four albums I'll be putting up here for your delectation, 'Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy' is my personal least favourite, so I'm not gonna say much about it.
Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad album - far from it - it's just that it doesn't really do as much, musically, for me as the other three.
I guess it's because it's so much more upbeat and melodic than the others that I find it a little dull - which is ironic, as the lyrical content is pretty dark. 'Burning Airlines Give You So Much More' is about an aircrash near Paris in 1974 and 'The Great Pretender' is about an insane machine raping a housewife.

Oh, incidentally, 'Burning Airlines Give You So Much More' is where the ex-Jawbox band, Burning Airlines, that so many people seem to like but I couldn't give a gnats fart about, got their name from. So now you know, unless you already know, in which case, I just reminded you. You're welcome.

Several things of note about the album are that a VERY pre-MTV music video was made for the track 'China, My China'...

...featuring proto-punk icon Judy Nylon of the band Snatch, the lyrics to the track 'The True Wheel' came to Eno in a dream, and inspired the name of the shortlived band he was a member of, along with Phil Manzanera, The 801, who released one so-so live album (although a couple of better quality bootlegs are available), 'The Fat Lady Of Limbourg' allegedly refers to a groupie of voluminous size that Eno bedded on tour, and the entire concept behind the revolutionary/Communist Chinese slant** to the album was said to have been kicked off by Eno chancing upon some postcards featuring images of a revolutionary chinese opera of the same name.

Don't let my lack of enthusiasm put you off, by the way, as it only really suffers in comparison to the other three recordings that surround it - by anyone else's standards, it's a fantastic album...only by my own exacting standards is it a bit boring.

*

*insert 'pink oboe' joke here.

** Also, I just realised that to the uptight, overly PC eye, this could seem like a racial slur. It isn't, obviously, it's just unfortunate wording on my part, but I'm keeping it in anyway, so fuck you.